"Does darkspawn blood stain? Getting it into vials sounds messy, and I like this armor. Getting another nice outfit bloodstained doesn't sound fun."

"You're likely to get more darkspawn blood on you in the process of killing them than in the process of collecting their blood afterward. It does sometimes stain, unfortunately."

"Maybe I should have held out for black leather."

He smiles slightly.

"If the most we have to worry about from darkspawn is laundry, I think we should count ourselves as lucky."

"Yes," Ambrose agrees.

Walk walk walk. The wilds are surprisingly pretty. Especially when you've spent most of your life inside a stone tower.

Not far out, they encounter a caravan recently attacked by darkspawn. There's one soldier still alive. Ambrose offers him an escort back to camp, but he insists that all he needs are some bandages and a gulp of healing potion and he can make it back by himself. Ambrose doesn't argue.

Would he also like a little bit of Helpful Magic, just in case?

The soldier accepts Carlos's assistance. Ambrose smiles.

Carlos casts helpful magic. He only hopes it's enough.

"He'll be all right," says Ambrose, looking back to watch the soldier limp up the trail. "There aren't any darkspawn near enough to find him before he reaches the gate."

"Good."

"How many darkspawn did it take to do this, I wonder."

"At least a dozen, probably more," says Ambrose, looking at the overturned wagon by the side of the road and the bodies scattered around it.

Shiral looks around, too, scrutinizing the tracks around the site of the... battle, if it can be called that.

"Fourteen," she concludes. "Or fifteen. I'd have to climb that ridge to find out whether they had one archer there or two."

"Are darkspawn much more difficult to kill than people? We ran into some on the way south, but Duncan got most of them."

"Not much more difficult, no."

"Alright then," she shrugs, apparently unconcerned by the possibility of running into any.

"Great, let's go."

They can continue walking until they run into darkspawn or ruins, then, whichever comes first.

Darkspawn are the thing that comes first.

"Darkspawn ahead," says Ambrose, gesturing at the crumbling stone walls on top of a low hill beside the path. "Five or ten. I don't expect we'll have much trouble with them."

Acara draws her sword and dagger.

The mages don't really need to draw weapons but they certainly look more focused.

Shiral strings her bow.